Jewish New York

Jewish New York
Author: Deborah Dash Moore
Publisher: NYU Press
Total Pages: 510
Release: 2017-10-10
Genre: History
ISBN: 1479864471

The definitive history of Jews in New York and how they transformed the city Jewish New York reveals the multifaceted world of one of the city’s most important ethnic and religious groups. Jewish immigrants changed New York. They built its clothing industry and constructed huge swaths of apartment buildings. New York Jews helped to make the city the center of the nation’s publishing industry and shaped popular culture in music, theater, and the arts. With a strong sense of social justice, a dedication to civil rights and civil liberties, and a belief in the duty of government to provide social welfare for all its citizens, New York Jews influenced the city, state, and nation with a new wave of social activism. In turn, New York transformed Judaism and stimulated religious pluralism, Jewish denominationalism, and contemporary feminism. The city’s neighborhoods hosted unbelievably diverse types of Jews, from Communists to Hasidim. Jewish New York not only describes Jews’ many positive influences on New York, but also exposes their struggles with poverty and anti-Semitism. These injustices reinforced an exemplary commitment to remaking New York into a model multiethnic, multiracial, and multireligious world city. Based on the acclaimed multi-volume set City of Promises: A History of the Jews of New York winner of the National Jewish Book Council 2012 Everett Family Foundation Jewish Book of the Year Award, Jewish New York spans three centuries, tracing the earliest arrival of Jews in New Amsterdam to the recent immigration of Jews from the former Soviet Union.

Community and Polity

Community and Polity
Author: Daniel Judah Elazar
Publisher: Jewish Publication Society
Total Pages: 512
Release: 2001
Genre: Jews
ISBN: 1590450671

Poor Jews

Poor Jews
Author: Naomi Levine
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 144
Release: 2017-09-08
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1351319426

The popular image of the Jewish community is that it consists primarily of members of the middle and upper middle classes. But this image is far from true. Poor Jews: An American Awakening shatters, once and for all, the stereotype of Jewish affluence. Citing national data and descriptions of the life-styles of the Jewish poor, the authors reveal unique social characteristics of the Jewish poor—including the surprising statistic that over two-thirds of the members of this group are past the age of sixty, thus experiencing the compounded disadvantage of being poor, elderly, and deserted by the young, mobile Jewish community. Reasons for the "invisibility" of Jewish poverty are examined, as well as how the Jewish community has responded to poverty within its own ethnic group and Jewish attitudes toward the welfare state and charity. The lack of Jewish participation in antipoverty programs is cited, along with measures which will bring them fully into this and other federal and state programs.

American Shtetl

American Shtetl
Author: Nomi M. Stolzenberg
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 496
Release: 2022-02-08
Genre: HISTORY
ISBN: 0691199779

A compelling account of how a group of Hasidic Jews established its own local government on American soil Settled in the mid-1970s by a small contingent of Hasidic families, Kiryas Joel is an American town with few parallels in Jewish history—but many precedents among religious communities in the United States. This book tells the story of how this group of pious, Yiddish-speaking Jews has grown to become a thriving insular enclave and a powerful local government in upstate New York. While rejecting the norms of mainstream American society, Kiryas Joel has been stunningly successful in creating a world apart by using the very instruments of secular political and legal power that it disavows. Nomi Stolzenberg and David Myers paint a richly textured portrait of daily life in Kiryas Joel, exploring the community's guiding religious, social, and economic norms. They delve into the roots of Satmar Hasidism and its charismatic founder, Rebbe Joel Teitelbaum, following his journey from nineteenth-century Hungary to post–World War II Brooklyn, where he dreamed of founding an ideal Jewish town modeled on the shtetls of eastern Europe. Stolzenberg and Myers chart the rise of Kiryas Joel as an official municipality with its own elected local government. They show how constant legal and political battles defined and even bolstered the community, whose very success has coincided with the rise of political conservatism and multiculturalism in American society over the past forty years. Timely and accessible, American Shtetl unravels the strands of cultural and legal conflict that gave rise to one of the most vibrant religious communities in America, and reveals a way of life shaped by both self-segregation and unwitting assimilation.

Illuminating the Path to Vibrant American Jewish Communities

Illuminating the Path to Vibrant American Jewish Communities
Author: Jacob B. Ukeles
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 301
Release: 2022-08-17
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 3031076427

This book argues that the way to ensure that American Jewish life flourishes is to create vibrant local communities and that the ability to thrive will be won or lost in the trenches of each locality. For every generalization about the Jews of America, one can say, “maybe, but it depends where.” In the United States, Jewish life is up close and personal where local variations on national themes make a huge difference. The author presents case studies using in-depth analysis of data from nine Jewish community studies to illuminate eleven critical American Jewish policy issues. The analysis is used to formulate a range of policy options for different types of communities. This book is for anyone who cares about the future of American Jewry. It should be of particular interest to the lay leaders and professionals who play a role in Jewish nonprofits. It is also of great interest to researchers and students of Jewish studies and Jewish communal service.

American Jewry

American Jewry
Author: Eli Lederhendler
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 357
Release: 2017
Genre: History
ISBN: 0521196086

In the United States, Jews have bridged minority and majority cultures - their history illustrates the diversity of the American experience.

A Fortress in Brooklyn

A Fortress in Brooklyn
Author: Nathaniel Deutsch
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 423
Release: 2021-05-11
Genre: History
ISBN: 0300258372

The epic story of Hasidic Williamsburg, from the decline of New York to the gentrification of Brooklyn "A rich chronicle of the Satmar Hasidic community in Williamsburg. . . . This expert account enlightens."—Publishers Weekly “One of the most creative and iconoclastic works to have been written about Jews in the United States.”—Eliyahu Stern, Yale University The Hasidic community in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn is famously one of the most separatist, intensely religious, and politically savvy groups of people in the entire United States. Less known is how the community survived in one of the toughest parts of New York City during an era of steep decline, only to later resist and also participate in the unprecedented gentrification of the neighborhood. Nathaniel Deutsch and Michael Casper unravel the fascinating history of how a group of determined Holocaust survivors encountered, shaped, and sometimes fiercely opposed the urban processes that transformed their gritty neighborhood, from white flight and the construction of public housing to rising crime, divestment of city services, and, ultimately, extreme gentrification. By showing how Williamsburg’s Hasidim rejected assimilation while still undergoing distinctive forms of Americanization and racialization, Deutsch and Casper present both a provocative counter-history of American Jewry and a novel look at how race, real estate, and religion intersected in the creation of a quintessential, and yet deeply misunderstood, New York neighborhood.

The Triple Package

The Triple Package
Author: Amy Chua
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 309
Release: 2014-02-04
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1101610131

"That certain groups do much better in America than others—as measured by income, occupational status, test scores, and so on—is difficult to talk about. In large part this is because the topic feels racially charged. The irony is that the facts actually debunk racial stereotypes. There are black and Hispanic subgroups in the United States far outperforming many white and Asian subgroups. Moreover, there’s a demonstrable arc to group success—in immigrant groups, it typically dissipates by the third generation—puncturing the notion of innate group differences and undermining the whole concept of 'model minorities.'" Mormons have recently risen to astonishing business success. Cubans in Miami climbed from poverty to prosperity in a generation. Nigerians earn doctorates at stunningly high rates. Indian and Chinese Americans have much higher incomes than other Americans; Jews may have the highest of all. Why do some groups rise? Drawing on groundbreaking original research and startling statistics, The Triple Package uncovers the secret to their success. A superiority complex, insecurity, impulse control—these are the elements of the Triple Package, the rare and potent cultural constellation that drives disproportionate group success. The Triple Package is open to anyone. America itself was once a Triple Package culture. It’s been losing that edge for a long time now. Even as headlines proclaim the death of upward mobility in America, the truth is that the old-fashioned American Dream is very much alive—but some groups have a cultural edge, which enables them to take advantage of opportunity far more than others. • Americans are taught that everyone is equal, that no group is superior to another. But remarkably, all of America’s most successful groups believe (even if they don’t say so aloud) that they’re exceptional, chosen, superior in some way. • Americans are taught that self-esteem—feeling good about yourself—is the key to a successful life. But in all of America’s most successful groups, people tend to feel insecure, inadequate, that they have to prove themselves. • America today spreads a message of immediate gratification, living for the moment. But all of America’s most successful groups cultivate heightened discipline and impulse control. But the Triple Package has a dark underside too. Each of its elements carries distinctive pathologies; when taken to an extreme, they can have truly toxic effects. Should people strive for the Triple Package? Should America? Ultimately, the authors conclude that the Triple Package is a ladder that should be climbed and then kicked away, drawing on its power but breaking free from its constraints. Provocative and profound, The Triple Package will transform the way we think about success and achievement.